The Bills in Toronto – Securing a future for the team in Buffalo?

The Bills announced an extension of the “Bills in Toronto” series.  This extension will see the series continue an additional 5 years.  The Buffalo Bills need Southern Ontario.  Not only for the 15-20,000 fans that buy up tickets to the Ralph each Sunday, and not for the increase of sales at local Wal-marts and Target markets, but for the television revenue and exposure that comes from being associated with a big market.  Bigger market = bigger money, obviously.

The GTA is amongst the top five markets in North America, dwarfing most other NFL markets save for NY, LA, Chicago and Philadelphia – http://canadatvmedia.com/canadian-television/statistics.html - So don’t think this is about the extra gate revenue.  It is also the 51st largest urban market in the world.  Compare to Buffalo, which is the 51st largest in North America and doesn’t even figure into world rankings.  Nothing of what I’m arguing is groundbreaking, rather I am merely trying to put into perspective the difference in size and wealth difference between the two cities.

When gauging the success or failure of the current five-year pact between the Bills and Rogers consider that the Bills just announced that they have sold out the first two home games. For a team that has done very little in the way of success on the field, that’s not bad. Can we say it’s a direct result of the Bills in Toronto series? No, not necessarily.  I don’t have the information to say that with any degree of certainty.  What is for certain is that more Southern Ontarians are making the trip to Orchard Park, and are doing it with increasing regularity.

The Buffalo Bills belong to Buffalo and WNY, and I really don’t think many outside that area are seriously thinking the Bills will move to Toronto – not now, anyway.  I think the attitude of many, but not all, is increasing frustration at the realization that losing the team to another market is a possibility.  When one considers all I have said about the size and money that are connected to T.O., I can see how Bills fans (including myself) could be worried about the NFL, Bills ownership and Rogers Communications setting in motion the relocation of the franchise Northwest, about an hour down the QEW.

What I am hoping that Western New Yorkers understand is that the Bills giving up one home game to play in Toronto is the ideal situation given the circumstances.  The league, obviously, wants two things in this situation – to cash-in on Toronto, a relatively un-tapped market, and not to severe ties to the large and supportive fanbase in Western New York.

Toronto is not a “Bills-Town”…yet.  It doesn’t have any one team that it supports en masse, but, like the city itself, is very diverse, and affords its inhabitants the right to support whichever team they like.  For the Bills, this is music to their ears because they have the opportunity to devour the lion’s share of fans.  By far, Buffalo is the closest team to Toronto, with Detroit a distant second.  Continuing the relationship will slowly convert new fans to join Bills Nation.  New generations of Southern Ontarians will grow up surrounded with the Blue and Red (and perhaps the double-blue of the CFL’s Argonauts).

The other big factor at play here is that by putting a game a year in Toronto, Buffalo is laying claim to Toronto as part of its territory.  Toronto has been talking about NFL expansion as far back as the 1970s.  Territorial rights fees are huge today, but a team in Toronto would be outside the zone of territorial rights fees that the Bills could request if they were a “Buffalo-based” team.  By playing one game a year in Toronto, the Bills can say that Toronto is part of their territory and request a territorial rights fee, should the city get a future expansion franchise, or another NFL team try to re-locate to the city.  And, “if” the team is forced to move, I would think Western New Yorkers would prefer them to move to Toronto as opposed to any other city in North America.  I am not saying this will happen, just a “what if” scenario.

As a huge Bills fan myself, I really love to see the partnership between the two cities.  Not because I want the team to move to Toronto, because I don’t. Rather, I believe the deal is imperative to the future of the Bills in Buffalo.

…and that is the Last Word.

2 Comments

1. 

   Dwayne

   May 23, 2012 at 1:32 pm

   I have yet to hear anyone that has been to a Bills game in Toronto enjoy themselves. Not many good seats at all, no atmosphere and no home field advantage for the Bills. I’m a huge BEARS fan and was completely devasted when I had to watch them play in Toronto a couple years ago. I LOVE Bills home games against anyone and I think it would be a tragedy if they ever move out of Buffalo.

   Reply
2. 

   Ben

   May 23, 2012 at 5:54 pm

   I’m a Bills fan, and I live just outside Toronto. It is far closer for me to go to the Bills in Toronto games, than it is to go to Buffalo.

   Despite that, I’ve been a Bills Season Ticket holder in the past (I’m not now), and I have been to 1 game at the Rogers Center…. I’d still be a season ticket holder, but I live farther away from Buffalo than I did before. Still I do go to 1-2 games per year at the Ralph.

   The Ralph is a much better experience than Toronto. The Ralph is tailgating, the Ralph is fun, the Ralph is crazy passionate fans. But if we need to have 1 game per year in Toronto, to ensure the viability of a team in a city that has really been hit hard economically (in Buffalo) than so be it.

   If thats what it takes to keep the Bills in Buffalo, I’m all for trying to get more fans in Toronto.

   The only thing thats really a downer is that they lose the home field advantage for one “home” game a year, but as Mike says, perhaps as the fanbase grows that will get better.

   What they can’t make up for though is this.

   They play Seattle in December.
   December is cold and snow, and wind at the Ralph.
   Seattle is a dome team who has problems outside in the weather.
   But the Seattle game is the December game scheduled for Toronto this year.

   That kinda sucks.

   Reply